


Indisposed Introductions

by A_Cold_Wind_Blows



Series: Spider-Arya [2]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Spider-Gwen (Comics)
Genre: Arya Stark is Spider-Gwen, F/M, Gen, One Shot, superhero au, the fancy continues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-03
Updated: 2017-11-03
Packaged: 2019-01-28 02:47:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12596420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Cold_Wind_Blows/pseuds/A_Cold_Wind_Blows
Summary: Arya was never really good with boys and being Spider-Woman has not helped in that regard.





	Indisposed Introductions

**Author's Note:**

> I guess I've become obsessed with this AU.

"What did this guy call himself again?"

"It was like... something murdery. Megakill or Massacre or something."

"Ugh, overcompensating much?"

Even though it made her ribs hurt, Arya couldn't help but giggle. She was leaning forward against the back of her desk chair, shirt off for the moment as Sansa stood behind her with needle and string. Sansa tittered as well before reaching over Arya's shoulder for a pair of sewing scissors set on the desk. One snip later and Arya felt comfortable to release her breath. Not that she'd been holding it very long. After all, Sansa was right, she had a steady hand.

"See? Sewing a cut isn't much different from sewing a stitch," Sansa said with a little tilt of her chin and a barely hidden smile. "And you were worried I would mess it up. What am I, an idiot? Don't you heal, like, super fast or something?"

"It's not that simple." Arya stood, keeping her forearm over her chest while she grabbed a hoodie off her bedpost and started shouldering it on. "Yeah I heal fast, but if I don't stitch the wound, it could heal wrong or leave a big honking scar or something. All I need is for mom to start asking me awkward questions when it's beach season."

Sansa seemed to think on that for a moment and then shrugged. Carefully placing her precious equipment back into the Dazzler-emblazoned sewing kit, and tossing the needle she'd used on Arya's back into the "hazard" garbage bag that was discreetly used for bloody rags and the like, Sansa seemed to take extra care in everything she was doing. A classic stall tactic. At one point she even smoothed out Arya's bed spread, even though Arya herself hadn't bothered to make her bed since she was 10-years old.

"Well... anyway, thanks."

"Of course, of course," Sansa said with a dismissive wave. "I'm always glad to help you. You are my sister after all. I'm not like, a monster bitch. Just a regular sized one."

Arya forced a smile and mumbled, "Right..."

Twiddling her fingers nervously in her hoodie pocket, Arya did all she could to avoid eye contact as she tried to telepathically hint that it was time for Sansa to leave her room. Arya wanted to take these jeans off and lounge around for the night. Unfortunately her sister didn't seem to take the hint. More likely she just didn't care, and usually Arya wouldn't care either, but ever since Sansa had found out the truth of her web-slinging lifestyle, the whole balance of their relationship had felt out of wack.

Fortunately Sansa broke the awkwardness first, though not in the way that Arya expected.

"Did you and Edric break up?"

Arya turned away to hide her flush. "Yeah, it's whatever."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Sansa said with a comforting tone, though she didn't move from her spot on the bed. "I liked Edric. He was always very polite. Never stared at my cleavage once, not even when I was having period boobs. And he seemed to really like you, which I thought was nice. It's always fun when the other person likes you a little bit more than you like them."

"That's not true at all," Arya said, holding back the crack in her voice and trying to not let the heat behind her eyes grow. "Edric liked me but I was crazy about him. He dumped me. But whatever, I'm a loser anyway."

"You are not!"

Her spider-sense gave her no warning when suddenly Arya felt strong hands turn her around by the shoulders and then slap onto her face so hard that her lips were puckering. Sansa had a fire in her eyes that looked both terrifying and consuming.

"You are great, and I don't just mean because you're a superhero. You're smart, and funny, and you have good priorities and common sense. And you're pretty," Sansa added quickly. "I mean, okay real talk, you're not a conventional beauty like me, but so what? Pretty faces are a dime a dozen. Your face has character. You have father's eyes, and mother's chin, and fantastic eyebrows. Far nicer than mine."

"Uhhh... thwank yhou?"

"You could almost say that with such beauty, you have an opportunity to explore it," Sansa explained, leaning so close now that Arya was worried her sister was about to kiss her or something.

"Uhhh... Exsplorhe hyow?" Arya asked before pulling Sansa's hands off her cheeks. "Is this about you giving me a makeover or something?"

"Better. I want to set you up on a blind date."

"Ugh, no, stop," Arya groaned. "I don't want to date anyone. I barely have time for my own life, let alone involving someone else. Edric was right to break up with me. I wasn't being fair to him, and that'll be true of anyone I date."

"So you just give up on love? Give up on boys? On girls?"

"What?"

"What?"

Arya shook that off. "The answer is no Sansa!"

And with that she literally and dramatically put her foot down and stared right in her sister's face. All her life, Arya had always felt cowed and defeated by Sansa, even before they ever tried to compete. It just always felt so foregone. Eddard Stark had two daughters; one was the pretty, funny, charming, smart, studious, pious, perfect one, and the other one was the short runt with greasy hair.

But that was before she'd become Spider-Woman. To Sansa's credit, seeing her little sister stand up for herself for the first time with such iron-clad boldness didn't make her shirk at all. She seemed ready to argue back but as soon as she opened her mouth, Arya turned her head and then her back on Sansa, making it clear that this was the end of the discussion.

Victory was at hand as Sansa audibly hummed in disappointment. She picked up her sewing kit and walked away but as she came to the bedroom door, Sansa paused and turned back one last time.

"Look, if you really don't want to date anyone, I won't force you," Sansa said. "But I think it would be a good idea. Don't let Spider-Woman become your entire life, okay? You need to be Arya Stark sometimes too."

Her mind flashed to something that Jon had said which sounded very familiar, so Arya just nodded. She couldn't disagree with Jon after all.

But Sansa wasn't done. "And to be honest with you... I was kind of hoping I could help you with all of that. Like maybe I'll try to make an effort of including you in plans with my friends or... or if you do want to date, I can help you make plans or whatever. I'll even help cover for you on Spider-Woman stuff, so maybe something like Edric won't happen again. I bet some of the teachers would even go easier on you if I talked to them. After all, no one at Midtown would guess that preppy honor roll student Sansa Stark is lying for her sister."

"You would really do that?" Arya asked, to which Sansa nodded immediately. "But why? I mean, why now? Because I'm Spider-Woman?"

"No, no!" Sansa answered too quickly. "Okay maybe."

"Sansa..." Arya didn't bother hiding her eye roll.

"No, no, not like that, not like- it's about me okay? I-I want to help you more."

"You helped me just now!" Arya laughed, lifting her arm up and pointing a thumb at her freshly sutured wound.

"Only because Jon wasn't available! Face it Arya, Jon helps you with all the super hero stuff, and apparently he's doing a good job because you're still alive. I can't help you with your classes because I don't have a science focus like you. I can't even help you cover with mom! So I thought... I don't know... maybe... this was one thing where I could be of some help..."

Arya sighed. What a foolish, rookie move it had been to underestimate her sister. Sansa always got what she wanted, in whatever way she needed to do it, even if it meant appealing to Arya's stupid sisterly feelings.

"Gaaaahhhhecchh.... fine! Fine. You can set me up with someone."

"Yay goody!" Sansa sang with a little dainty hop, cheering herself. "My friend Mya will be so happy, it's her brother I was thinking of setting you up with, since he's already been vetted. Plus, she showed me his Tinder profile, and even I had to fan myself off a bit when I saw his workout pics."

"Ew, pictures of himself working out? Sounds like a real douche bag."

"He isn't, I promise. You're gonna love him."

*****

“I think it’s a good idea.”

It took a moment for Jon’s words to register, but when they did Arya bolted upright in his bed, her freshly periwinkle-painted toes carefully held above the dorm room’s browning carpet. She stared at Jon’s back as he continued working on a microchip that he had built for some robotics project but eventually he seemed to realize her mood. With a sigh he put his soldering iron down and turned in his chair to face her.

“I’m sorry, I must have misheard you,” Arya said. “Because it sounded like you were saying that Sansa setting me up on a blind date was a good idea. But I know you couldn’t have said that because I know you would never say anything that stupid.”

“Arya-”

“This is Sansa, remember? Sansa Stark? My sister? The girl who couldn’t tell the difference between a stylus and mascara? That girl? You think she has any idea what I need? Any idea what Spider-Woman needs?”

Jon looked disappointed in her but it couldn’t hold a candle to Arya’s disappointment in him. Until he spoke again.

“The blind date wasn’t Sansa’s idea, okay?” Jon explained. “Last week she came by and told me she wanted to be a part of the team. Specifically, she wanted to help me, help you, over the coms.”

“What!?” Sansa being on Team Spider-Woman would have made Arya quit all together, great responsibility or not.

“Don’t worry, I talked her out of it. But I couldn’t get her to leave and-and she was crying, like a lot, and so I… well, I panicked. I suggested that maybe she could help you with-”

“Unbelievable!” Arya fell back onto Jon’s bed with a groan. “So basically you made your problem my problem. That’s great Jon. Yeah, next time just tell her Spider-Woman needs help walking in high heels.”

“134 hours.”

“What?” Arya sat back up.

“Last week, you spent 134 hours in the suit,” Jon said. “The week before it was 119 hours. The week before that 89 hours. The week before that 107. Do I need to go on?”

“That’s not…” Arya wasn’t sure what to say. “Some of that is me sleeping in the suit.”

“Yeah, and you want to talk about stupid? Falling asleep in the multi-million-dollar super suit where your mom could easily come in and catch you. I wouldn’t really consider that a smart idea, would you?”

Now Arya was getting mad. “So a man is the answer to all my problems, is that it?

“Arya, come on…” Jon said, brushing his long curling brown hair away from his eyes. “That’s not what I’m saying.”

“Then what are you saying?”

“You’re losing yourself in this!” Jon startled her. “You’re spending more time as Spider-Woman than you are as Arya Stark and I’m worried!”

“Well don’t. Everything’s fine,” Arya said. “I’m getting better at this Jon.”

He nodded. “You’re getting better at fighting. You’re getting better at web-swinging and remembering to upkeep your web shooters. You’re getting better at the investigative stuff and the science stuff and you’re getting better at using that big brain of yours instead of your fists all the time when you fight.

“But I mean… you’re getting worse at other things. You eat less, you sleep less, you keep dropping clubs and after school classes and… and I know we joke, but you’re showering less. Thank God you have this date or when would you have showered Arya?!”

Arya whipped the towel that Jon had let her borrow at his head, blinding him and knocking him off balance while she put her clothes on, toes still wet with polish and hair still damp with water. She was dressed in her nice jeans and a flower-embroidered blouse when Jon ripped the wet towel off his face. 

“You’re getting mathematically worse at balancing your two lives. Sometimes it feels like you’re not even trying! Like one day you’re going to just stop being Arya Stark altogether and then only Spider-Woman will be left!”

A chill ran up her spine. Part of Arya hated that idea, but she recognized the part that found it appealing. Already plans began to form. She could say she got into some science program across state, and then take online classes for the credits. Mom would buy that. Then Arya could focus her days on Spider-Woman, make it really work. It would be blessedly… simple. Clean.

“It’s just easier being her,” Arya eventually confessed. “Arya Stark’s life is so complicated and boring and… lonely.”

“It doesn’t have to be.”

Arya chuckled so she wouldn’t cry. “Yes it does. It has to be this way. Jon, what do I do if I meet this guy and we actually… I don’t know, fall in love or something? I can’t tell him the truth. I can’t tell anyone the truth! I just have to keep acting like this flaky, distant asshole, making excuses over and over and I-I can’t-”

“Maybe you can,” Jon moved away from his desk, taking Arya’s hands into his own and pressing a soft kiss on her fingers. “You told me, right? And now Sansa knows, and she’s taken the whole thing with surprising acceptance.”

“But Mycah-”

“That wasn’t your fault. That was him.”

A shrill ringing came from Jon’s phone on his desk. In a flash he was back by his computer, turning the monitor on and typing away on the keyboard. The emotional whiplash was substantial, and Arya took the moment to wipe away her tears. She knew Jon wouldn’t have stopped talking to her for a phone call. Or even a calendar alert.

So this was Spider-Woman stuff.

“What the hell?” Jon asked, staring at his screen like it didn’t make any sense. “What kind of timing… this is unreal. Like fate or something.”

“What is it?” Arya’s curiosity overrode her feelings as she leaned over Jon’s shoulder and glanced at the screen.

SUSPECT OFF GRID, COLLAR REPORTS ILLEGAL MOVEMENTS, SEND UNITS TO ENGAGE PAROLEE#37867, BE ADVISED, EXTREME CAUTION REQUIRED

“Is this like a police report?”

“No,” Jon said. “I hacked into the Raft’s security protocols so we could keep an eye on some of the more dangerous chuckle heads you’ve put away. Just to get some warning if any of them escaped, or tried to escape, or even got released the legal way.”

“Is it a jailbreak?” Arya could use a good fight right about now.

“No, this is just an alert from one of those house arrest ankle monitors.” Jon was typing something, opening more windows on his screen, but Arya didn’t need them. There was only one bad guy that Spider-Woman had put down who got house arrest instead of actual jail time.

“I just can’t believe he’d be so dumb. Breaking the judge’s ruling will just get him thrown right back into the Raft.”

“Well, Electro wasn’t exactly known for his brains, even before he got his powers.” Arya was already sifting through her backpack for the suit. “Now I get the chance to beat him senseless again for Mycah. I’ll thank him for the early Hannukah gift.”

“Wait, no, you can’t, you have your blind date in an hour. Let me just send out a police bulletin.”

“There’s no time.” Arya slipped her mask on. “You can just call Sansa and cancel that for me, right?”

“Arya wait!”

But she’d already jumped out the window.

*****

Halfway across town, Jon managed to upload the tracking software to Arya’s HUD and she swung over to Chinatown, landing on the roof of a parking garage. The entrances were all closed off, signs for construction littering the walkways, but Arya didn’t see or hear any construction crews. That was sufficiently suspicious.

Slipping through a few wire-fences, she realized the ankle monitor’s signal was coming from the basement. Arya was careful to check all her corners and blind spots for traps along the way. Electro wasn’t the kind of villain to think that far ahead but it never hurt to be cautious and part of Arya wanted to show Jon that he was wrong, that she was handling being Spider-Woman just fine, ignoring the fact that that wasn’t exactly what Jon was criticizing. It was just easier to keep being mad at him right now.

Eventually she tracked the signal to a pair of double doors that were blown wide open, a large indentation on both doors where something had hit them. Hard. Like freight train hard. The doors were made of something thick, the streaking patterns indicating titanium or maybe even chromium. Arya forgot all about Jon and Sansa and dating and everything else.

“What the hell?” she whispered, brushing a hand over a particularly warped piece of metal. It looked more torn than broken, almost like something sharp had pierced it…

“You!”

A loud boom, followed by harsh static crackle and pathetic cries of pain, pulled Arya’s attention away from the broken doors and to the crumpled heap of limbs that came out of a bathroom. He was wearing a green and gold form-fitting suit, covered in various gadgets and medical devices to help control his powers. His mouth was open in a silent scream, strands of pure electricity arcing between his upper and bottom teeth.

Eventually the ankle monitor changed from an alarming red color to a soothing blue, and Electro went still. He was conscious and panting, rage and embarrassment dripping from his wormy lips and sly, sneaky eyes. Once he had been one of the most handsome men that Arya had ever met, but now his outsides finally matched his insides, his skin a scarred, radioactive mess.

“Hey Joffy,” Arya teased.

“I’ll kill you…” he panted. “And my name isn’t Joffrey anymore, it’s Electro.”

“Awww, Joffy, that’s so cute!”

Like shooting fish in a barrel, Joff took the bait and tried to fire another shot of electric energy at her, but his ankle monitor switched to red and all the force gathering in his palm turned back on him, arcs of electricity slashing him in the face and chest.

While swinging across town, Jon had informed her that the power-dampener integrated into the ankle monitor had been shut off remotely. Arya had simply asked that he teach her the reboot protocol. Her suit had a computer in it after all, and wifi.

Fighting smart, not hard.

“It’s okay champ,” Arya said. “Even if you could access your powers, well, we know how that would go down, right? I’d take you down like a bitch. Again.”

Some monkeys could learn it seemed. Instead of veering off into another rage, Joffrey just focused all his strength on standing with what had to be jellified legs. Arya prepared herself for something bold or stupid, a punch or something at least, but instead Joff just found a way to piss her off.

He started laughing.

“Stupid Spider-girl, it doesn’t matter. I already did what I came here to do. You’ve got bigger problems than me now.” Joff even held his hands out in surrender, though the sneer on his face was victorious. “Take me to jail. I can’t wait to see the news tomorrow.”

“What did you do?”

“I made it right. Settled an old score.”

An incessant warning buzz was sliding up Arya’s neck like hot knives. “No…” She ran forward and took Joff by the throat before slamming him into the wall. That wiped the sneer off his face. “What did you do!? Does this have to do with the Stark girl?”

Joff looked confused but then he smiled. “That bitch has it coming. Her pygmy sister too.”

“You better start talking now Joff, because if you only start talking later, it’ll already be too-”

Like a bubble bursting, Arya’s senses ticked up in immediate panic, only allowing her the briefest moment of confusion before she obeyed her instincts and weaved her head to the right. A fraction of a second later, she felt the air twist and pull as some sort of metal object missed the back of her head by inches and smashed Joffrey’s nose into a mess of blood and teeth.

Throwing Joff to the side, Arya let the momentum of her dodge carry her into a roll onto the ground. There she pushed off with one hand so she went flying up into the air until her feet could connect with the ceiling. Settling into a crouch on the parking garage’s cement ceiling, Arya weaved her eyes over the area but couldn’t see where the attack came from. A second later she felt her senses going crazy again just as a second object flew right at her face.

Her powers did all the work. Arya’s hand grabbed the object a second before it made contact with her forehead, barely grasping it with two fingers and a thumb. It was some sort of long metal tube, like a pipe or a club. The pattern on it was red and black and-

Arya remembered an internet rumor about a weapon like this. “Oh God.”

“No, no, he’s not here, only me,” a voice lazily drawled from the darkness. “Though I can understand the confusion. Most people think of me as a god, especially women. It serves that even a Spider-Woman would be the same.”

He melted out of the shadows, dressed in a dark blue suit with edges of red and black lines, a pearl-white button-down shirt underneath, and a golden lion pendant hanging from his neck. He made for an imposing figure, his eyes radiating with reflected light. They were covered by a pair of rounded, black sunglasses that seemed ill-advised in this dark and quiet place.

Unless you were blind.

“I know your sobriquet so it’s only fair you know mine-”

“Daredevil. You’re Daredevil, the Kingpin of Hell’s Kitchen.”

“Oh no, no, the last man in charge was called Kingpin,,” the man said with a chuckle. “You can just call me Jaime. That’s what I wanted to say before you interrupted. I would like us to be friends, so I am trusting you with my real name.”

“I don’t want to know your name. I don’t want to know you!” Arya wished her voice sounded more threatening than panicked. “And you’re exactly like the last Kingpin. Just some big blowhard who thinks he’s so special. Thinks because he has power, he’s allowed to hurt who he wants and take what he wants. I’ve beaten men like you-”

“There are no men like me. Only me.”

“Ugh, get over yourself dude.”

Arya dived forward, hands out to try and grab this strange man with super strength, but he dodged her like he was politely moving aside in the lunch line. She landed with a loud slap to the ground, and immediately kicked out at his knees. He just jumped over her feet like he was skipping a puddle. 

Up in the air, he pulled both of his legs to his chest, and then actually gripped one of her calves in midair, pulling himself towards her face with shocking speed. Her nose was about to meet his elbow, but Arya managed to twist and spin away to a standing position.

Somehow, he was behind her.

Before she could think he landed a solid punch to her gut, knocking the wind out of Arya before he gripped her by the hood and slammed her face into the ground.

“Not bad, but you’re all speed with no finesse.”

“Finesse this!” Arya sprayed everything she could from her web shooters, but every strand was either blocked by the man’s walking stick or cut to shreds with a hidden knife he had in his sleeve. It was enough to make him let go of her, so Arya kept pouring on.

She managed to connect one shot to the man’s walking stick handle, and yanked on it to try and take the weapon from him. He didn’t release his grip though, and Arya ended up pulling him hard enough that he went bodily flying toward her, kicking at her chest with both legs. This time it actually connected but thankfully a hard cement column was there to stop Arya from flying out onto the street.

“Ow,” Arya’s groan became a scream when the man slammed his foot down on her arm, just hard enough that it didn’t break but enough that she’d have a bone bruise tomorrow.

“I’ve seen you on the news,” the man said, ignoring how Arya whimpered in agony. “You’re very fast, and frighteningly strong, but you move like someone who learned fighting from watching kung fu movies. You have no form, no consistency, and I’m sure you think that lends you a certain… unpredictability, but it won’t work on me. I can read your mind little girl.”

Arya looked up, the man’s face appearing upside down to her, his walking cane stamping on the ground right by her neck.

“Only discipline will cure you of that. I can teach you. Once you’ve mastered your own body, beating someone like me will be… well, it’ll be like catching flies with honey. Wait, you don’t eat flies do you? The spider-thing is just a gimmick I’m thinking.”

“What are you doing here?” Arya asked, trying to buy time to think. “How do you know Joffrey? Do you work for him?”

“Oh please! Joff is a… well, he’s a nuisance that I won’t be rid of anytime soon.” The man actually grimaced as if offended. “He went against orders and came here when he shouldn’t have. I was sent to collect him and while normally I’d be quite annoyed with such a base request… it has led to me to you and this fascinating turn of events.”

“Sent by who? Who is your boss?”

“His name is- oops. You almost got me.” Even though Arya couldn’t see his eyes, she could imagine him rolling them. “Now that I think about it, you really should get going.”

“Oh yeah?” Arya clenched her fist.

“Yes. But not like that,” he said, tapping his cane against Arya’s hand until it loosened. “I’m going to make the stakes more apparent.”

Arya tried to land a kick in his face but he moved away and gripped her ankle like a vice, flipping her over his back and slamming her face first into the ground again. The wind was knocked out of her and her boobs hurt like nothing else, but Arya felt okay enough until the tip of his cane was pressing into the back of her neck. It was enough weight that she worried he was going to break something, so Arya kept still.

“Joff has been obsessing over this ex of his. Very uncouth in my opinion. In his zeal, it seems he felt it necessary to go so far as to release a particularly brutish associate of ours and have him kill this young woman. Now usually, who cares, right? Except the man he released was an asset to our employer, and so for that, we need to make sure this associate is stopped and apprehended by the proper authorities.”

“Why? If I he’s back in prison then you can’t have him.”

“Is that right?” His smile in the darkness really made him look like the devil. “In any case, Gregor isn’t much of a strategist to begin with. He’ll end up back on our radar before long. I just hope the casualties are kept to a minimum before that happens. Including that poor girl.”

Joff’s words came back to her in a rush.

“What a tragic story. First her high school sweetheart becomes an electrically mutated freak, and now in his insanity he sends Clegane-”

“Clegane? Gregor Clegane? Wait, you mean the Rhino!? That’s your associate!?!”

Arya didn’t even realize the cane had been moved from her neck. The man was stepping back, as if he already knew what she was going to do. She hated that he was right. For a second Arya glanced over at Joff, still bloody and unconscious but Daredevil clucked his tongue.

“Don’t be greedy.”

She nodded and took off. Arya made sure she was a mile away before she activated her comm.

“Jon, I need Sansa’s location right now.”

*****

“I am really, really sorry about this. I promise Arya isn’t usually this flaky.”

“It’s really okay.”

Sansa nodded and glanced down at her phone again, willing that she would get a text or something, anything, from Arya or Jon. If this was a superhero thing then at least Sansa could say the date was cancelled and not feel so guilty. She couldn’t help but think that Arya was just dodging this to make her life more difficult.

Finding out that Arya was Spider-Woman had been one of the most emotionally exhausting experiences of Sansa’s life. On the one hand… it was so cool! Arya was like a little celebrity without any of the paparazzi or drama, and Sansa had looked back at all the known rumors and sightings of Spider-Woman, putting a date and an excuse that Arya had given her with every occasion. It was like a puzzle that Sansa had been working on for months finally decided to just reveal itself to her.

It took a week for the glamor to fade and for the worries to start. Some of the footage online showed Arya getting thrown into walls, crashing into buses, even being smacked in the face by some very disturbed man with giant metal bird wings near Coney Island. Sansa realized that Arya wasn’t a celebrity or a viral sensation, she was her sister. And she was getting hurt.

Her therapist’s words came back to Sansa time and time again though; “you cannot allow yourself to worry about the things outside of your control,” and that advice had carried Sansa through her father’s death. She used that wisdom again now. She knew she couldn’t stop Arya from being Spider-Woman, and she couldn’t do anything to make Arya physically safer (Jon had made that clear without pulling any punches) but damn it all, Sansa could at least help Arya have a little bit more normalcy and fun along with the danger. She had definitely earned it.

“Maybe I should get going.”

Sansa was knocked out of her thoughts. On instinct she placed her hand over his and conjured up her most heart-stopping smile, to convince him otherwise. Sansa knew she was right. This guy was perfect for Arya, she just needed Arya here to prove it.

“Oh no please, just another minute. I’m going to try calling one of Arya’s friends to see what’s going on, okay?”

“Look, Sansa, I agreed to this as a favor to my sister, but honestly I’m not one for blind dates. And I don’t really have time to be dating anyone, let alone someone still in high school.”

“She’s very mature for her age, she was already taking college courses as a sophomore,” Sansa said. “She used to date a boy who was about your age anyway, Michael or something. It was all fine. Plus you know what they say, girls mature faster than boys.”

Sansa could tell she had won the argument when he started to smile. He was a very serious boy, and much like Jon, his smiles were harder to earn. But once he showed those pearly white teeth and those jealousy-inducing dimples, any and every girl was a total goner. Sansa was sure even Arya would agree.

“I can wait ten more minutes, but then I- LOOK OUT!”

The world shook.

*****

She had never gone faster than this, her HUD was saying she was up to 130 mph on her web swinging but somehow it still felt like it wasn’t fast enough. Arya couldn’t stop thinking about what the Rhino had done to Madison Square Garden. The destruction had been huge, the repairs afterwards taking months. Everyone hated Spider-Woman for her part in the destruction, but worse than that, Arya had blamed herself. So many people had died…

No. That couldn’t happen to Sansa. It couldn’t. If their mother lost Sansa, only a year after losing her husband, her heart might not be able to take the shock. Arya knew she wouldn’t be able to survive the guilt either. She had to go faster.

Then, like an answer to her prayers, Arya turned on 47th street and saw him. A giant grey shape of enhanced strength and terrifying power, he towered at nearly 9 feet of pure indestructible carnage, and he was picking up speed. 

Gregor Clegane had been a two-bit piece of crap who enforced violence and subjugation for whoever paid him, and when Lannister Corp decided to conduct genetic experiments on him, they had somehow done the impossible. They had made an evil man even more monstrous.

He was charging down the street now, every step booming, the street cracking beneath his weight. The giant horn on his head, as dangerous as it was silly-looking, was slowly being lowered as his charge became a full-on sprint. Arya glanced ahead and saw a coffee shop with outdoor seating… and a girl with glossy, beautiful auburn hair sitting with a man in a dark t-shirt.

“No!” Arya screamed.

She knew she couldn’t take him head on. She knew she wasn’t strong enough to stop him from charging. And she knew from personal experience that Rhino could break through her webbing, so Arya began to panic. She had to do something.

“If I can’t stop him… I’ll just have to divert him.”

Swinging ahead of Rhino, Arya landed next to the biggest car parked on the street, some sort of SUV with a big hatchback, and pressed her hands and one leg against it. Her lenses switched to infrared, so she could see the giant heat mass that was Rhino through the car and waited for her moment. If she pushed too soon, Rhino would just bat the car away. If she pushed too late… well, she had to get this right on the first try.

Focusing on her senses and letting them guide her, Arya quieted the doubts in her mind and inhaled slowly, then exhaled even slower than that. Fear cuts deeper than swords.

Her adrenaline spiked and Arya pushed, adding so much force that she ended up pushing off the car and flipping through the air so she could land on the side of a bodega and watch the fireworks. The car was sliding, then flipping on its side, rolling like a log that was pushed down a hill. Rhino saw the car rolling toward him and tried to veer away, but it was coming too fast and he had too much momentum in him to stop. It crashed into his side with a surprisingly muffled crunch, finally coming to a stop in the face of Rhino but definitely throwing him off-balance.

The giant lumbering mass that was once a man careened off-direction, crashing into the wall thirty feet away from the coffee shop.

For a moment, the entire world felt like it shook.

Arya didn’t waste any time. This situation didn’t call for a quip or a clever idea. It didn’t call for a superhero or a cop or S.H.I.E.L.D. This needed to get done.

When Rhino managed to free himself from the brick and mortar pile that was once the wall to a clothing boutique, Arya was right there next to him with a mail box. Yanking it off the bolts that held it to the ground was easy. Carrying the mailbox was easy. Smashing it into the Rhino’s bewildered and dizzy face was just plain satisfying.

His face being one of the few parts of him that wasn’t covered in his experimental Rhino skin, Arya focused her next few swings there in the hopes of knocking him out. Unfortunately, it seemed like every smack broke the mailbox, sending letters and coupons flying in all directions as Arya pressed on. Eventually she was just holding a broken mailbox leg, the rest shattered or twisted into scraps on the ground at the Rhino’s feet.

She threw it away to try and blind him with a web, but with surprising speed for his size, Rhino gripped her wrist and squeezed. Her HUD reported that her right web-shooter was offline.

“I was told to kill the Stark bitch, but killing you will be my pleasure.”

“OR! Or… you could take up knitting.”

He yanked her arm so hard that she was sure it would dislocate, bringing her closer to his chest before he backhanded her face with his other hand. Arya’s world exploded into stars and her cheek felt like an overripe tomato and he was still gripping her wrist. The second hit actually hurt less than the first because she was in shock, but this time Arya could feel blood pooling in her mask.

“There… you were getting lippy for my taste. Women should know to keep quiet.”

“Oh no…” Arya said with a cough. “Did my itty-bitty words hurt your feewings? Better grow a thicker skin if you want to live in the real world sweetie.”

“Good. Keep talking. I want you to fight me. When I crush your bones, I want you to struggle. That just makes it more satisfying.”

“Okay creep-talk, we’re gonna have to work on your manners. Let’s start with a shower.”

Arya shot out a web-line, aimed at Rhino’s face, but he dodged as expected. The web connected with a fire hydrant and Arya yanked, causing the top to break off and release a torrent of water into the air. Before long a little rain storm was spreading over Arya and Rhino. He glanced distractedly behind him and Arya took the opportunity to kick at his arm until he let go of her. Pushing off his chest and jumping backwards through the air, Arya shot out a few web strands until the Rhino was covered from foot to face.

“You can’t hold me!” he shouted, already ripping a few webs off his arms.

“Sorry, not into you like that,” Arya said before she activated her taser web.

It worked even better than she imagined. The taser web was dangerous and unstable and Jon had scared her off using it in any situation whatsoever. In secret Arya had practiced using it at a junkyard, but eventually she’d agreed that they were too risky. The amount of voltage they used could easily kill someone, especially if they had a history of heart disease or a pacemaker, so Arya deemed it overkill.

Well, that along with a shower of water to act as a super conductor, was apparently enough for the Rhino. For a while he was screaming. A haunting, low noise that made the world shake as much as his steps. Then the screaming stopped and instead smoke was billowing from his mouth. Only then did Arya cut off the electric arc.

For a moment Rhino was still standing, a blank white stare facing up to the sky, his hands hanging limply to his sides. Then he dropped. The smack of his body on the curb was pathetically anti-climactic. Arya made sure to roll him over so he didn’t drown in a puddle, then webbed up the top of the fire hydrant to stop the water flow.

“That was amazing!”

Arya turned in alarm at the voice and then became alarmed for a different reason.

“It’s you!”

The man named Gendry frowned. “Uh, you remember me?”

“I- of course I do,” Arya recovered, trying to make her voice sound more authoritative. “I remember everyone I rescue. I was just surprised to see you again so- um, soon.”

“Yeah, looks like I owe you twice now Spider-Woman,” Gendry said with a smile that made Arya’s heart flutter. “Though if I didn’t know better, I might think you’re some kind of superhero stalker or something.”

“Well no worries on- the girl! Is the girl alright?” Arya panicked, glancing around for Sansa.

“Yeah she’s fine, still inside the cafe. I told her I’d check on the situation out here.”

“How brave of you,” Arya said with as much biting sarcasm as she could manage but somehow it came out all gross and flirty. “Well I guess you’re lucky I was here. Think you could take the Rhino on your own?”

To that Gendry smirked. “I can take care of myself.”

“I’ll bet,” Arya said, then she heard the sirens. “Well, I’ll leave you to your date or whatever.”

“Wait, wait, the girl isn’t my date,” Gendry said, his tone suddenly shifting from oh-so-confident to something resembling anxiety. “She’s just a friend of a friend, I promise. I mean, to be honest, I am here for a blind date but that girl skipped out on me.”

“I’m sure she had a good excuse,” Arya defended herself.

“I don’t even care. Whoever she is, she can’t hold a candle to you.”

Now Arya really had to go yet she felt frozen. Boys never really said things like that to her.

“Hey, let’s get out of here. Are you really scarred under that mask like everyone says?” Gendry shook his head. “You know what, I don’t even care. How about your name? Let’s start with that. Or I’ll keep calling you Spider-Woman if that’s your kink or whatever, but I’d love to have something a little more intimate- er I mean, can I know your name?”

“I-I-I-I…” 

Now he was standing only inches away from her. Arya couldn’t help but glance up at his neck, the thick corded muscles there, the broad plains of his shoulders.

“Gendry?”

They both started and looked toward the coffee shop. Sansa was walking toward them with one hand full of napkins pressed to her forehead. There was some blood there but otherwise she seemed uninjured. Looking at Sansa’s face though, Arya would have thought her sister found out her cat was murdered or something.

“What are you doing?” Again the question was directed at Gendry, and he seemed confused. Arya needed to remember that Spider-Woman and Sansa were strangers, since clearly Sansa had forgotten based on the way she was behaving.

“It’s alright ma’am, I was just making sure this young man was alright.”

“What? Oh yes, thank you Spider-Woman,” Sansa said with a polite nod before turning back to Gendry. “Excuse me, but were you hitting on this professional while she’s trying to do _her job_? You know she has to talk to you, right? It’s part of _her job._ She’s not doing it because you’re just that hot, she literally is obligated to check on you as part of _her job._ Don’t abuse that just to hit on her Gendry. It’s creepy. And another thing…”

Both Arya and Gendry were speechless. Thankfully only one of them had super powers to escape the awkward rant that seemed like it was only gaining steam.

*****

“I didn’t know how else to distract him,” Sansa said as she handed the ziploc bag full of ice to her. “I knew if he kept talking to you, then the next time he talks to Arya Stark he’ll probably recognize your voice. Not to mention… I mean, Arya Stark is definitely hot enough to date Gendry Waters, no question about it, but I don’t want you to have to compete against freaking Spider-Woman for his attention. That would be so awkward.”

“It’s cool, you were just doing _your job,_ ” Arya said, causing Sansa to giggle.

They were back in Arya’s room, keeping their voices down again so they didn’t wake their mom. When Arya crawled into her window at around 11 at night, Sansa had been waiting for her with ice and bandages. Plus some gossip about Gendry.

“I mean, you wouldn’t believe the gall of the man,” Sansa said with a flabbergasted shake of her head. “Here I was, spending the whole day talking you up, making my intentions very clear that I wanted him to meet you, and then he spends the whole time driving me home asking me questions about you! Spider you I mean.”

“I got it,” Arya laughed.

Sansa had helped clean all the blood off her face and her neck, touched up the wounds with medical tape and disinfectant, and was now putting everything away in a first aid box. The label had been ripped off however and replaced with a sticker from a Pokemon card collector case to make it more discreet.

“Honestly, men sometimes. It’s like they can only focus on the last shiny thing that they saw and they forget all about their prior commitments,” Sansa said as she finished, brushing off the hem of her day dress and sitting next to Arya on the bed. “He didn’t even seem fazed by the fact that we could have died. I’m still in shock for goodness sake! He could have comforted me! Instead it was Spider-Woman this, Spider-Woman that. I think he’s a real fanboy.”

Arya blushed but this time didn’t have her mask to hide it so Sansa noticed.

“I’m really sorry, is that too weird? I’ll get someone else. I can set you up with some other guy.”

“I don’t know,” Arya shrugged. “Who cares if he’s a fan of Spider-Woman? He seemed cute. Kind of smart. But not smarter than me, which is like… a good balance I guess. I like him. You should… you should set up another date.”

Sansa, to her credit, didn’t say anything smug about that for the rest of the night. 

*****

“NO NO NO NONONONO NO!”

Joff was jumping on the couch like an untrained monkey while Cersei sipped her double-bourbon in grim silence. The news was saying that Clegane would be taken to a temporary S.H.I.E.L.D. facility before they transferred him to his permanent residence at the Raft. Once there they would be able to grab him without too much trouble.

The most important thing was Spider-Woman, or rather the lack of mention of her on the news. He knew she’d been there. It was the only way Rhino could have been stopped. The police couldn’t handle him and the Avengers would never stoop to such a low-level criminal, no matter how powerful. They just had too much on their plates.

Jaime had made sure their criminal operations stayed on the perfect course of anonymity these past few months. They took enough power and wealth for themselves that they were kings in all but name on these streets, but not so much that the true power players in this world would take notice. If Iron Man or Thor started peeking their head into Hell’s Kitchen or any of their other operations, they probably wouldn’t last long. Syrio Forel had too many connections.

Spider-Woman on the other hand… well that was just fun sport.

“You’re certainly smiling a lot brother,” Tyrion said, perched on a chair next to Jaime as he stood with his back against the dining room table. “It can’t all be schadenfreude for our ludicrous nephew, so it must be something else. The question is, are you planning on using something you already have, or are you fantasizing about something you want?”

Jaime smirked. His damnable brother knew him too well.

“A new challenger has stepped up brother. You know how I love new challenges.”

**Author's Note:**

> It's NanoWriMo so updates will probably slow down on all my stories, but then again a month ago I hadn't even started writing this AU, so who knows what will happen?
> 
> Please comment and kudos!


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